Kahne takes victory at Pocono

Kahne had started the race from pole and was challenged at the front for most of the afternoon by his front row partner Jimmie Johnson. However the Gillett-Evernham driver fell out of what seemed to be the ideal pitting-sequence in the closing stages of the race.

Suddenly Kahne found needed to build a big-enough lead to be able to pit for the last time and not fall way back in the order. A handful of laps after he made his final stop for fuel and tyres a caution came out and he found himself third behind Brian Vickers and Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Both of them had pitted less than forty laps from the end and were good on fuel and tyres to make it to the end of the race without stopping again. But on the final restart with 19 laps remaining, Kahne made the most of his grip advantage to pass Earnhardt and then Vickers, pulling away to get his second win of the season.

"It was a great afternoon," said a drained Kahne following the race. "The car ran so well here. Nothing close to us when we were up front. We had such a good car all weekend from the time practice started to qualify first and winning this deal feels really good.

"It seemed like the hottest race of the year. The track was hot. The lines, the grooves, my car was super, super good."

Apart from a brief rain period that forced the race to be red-flagged on lap 71, temperatures on the track and inside the cars were quite demanding, especially for some who faced trouble with their cooling boxes like Dario Franchitti.

Vickers was able to hold on to second place in the end despite the tyre disadvantage he faced relative to other drivers who had fresher rubber than him in the final laps. Denny Hamlin made every attempt to get by him but eventually had to settle for third place.

Dale Earnhardt Jr had a nice battle in the last few laps with a charging Jeff Burton, who had almost overtaken the Hendrick driver with two laps remaining, but ran a bit wide and gave the spot back to him.

Jimmie Johnson led 56 laps in the afternoon but finished the race in sixth place after his strategy gamble didn't pay off like his crew chief expected. The reigning champion was the first to go out of sequence on the second half of the race, but the caution flags didn't fall his way.

Rounding up the top ten was Matt Kenseth in seventh, followed by a recovered Kurt Busch who had spun and damaged the front end of his car as soon as lap 41. Carl Edwards was ninth ahead of DEI's Mark Martin.

Dario Franchitti had an eventful return to the Sprint Cup, being involved in two incidents in the second half of the race. He first made contact with David Gilliland and the wall and was later hit by Sam Hornish Jr, who seemed to be reviving old rivalries by driving into his former open-wheel colleagues.

"The Hornish deal, I don't know," Franchitti said. "I went in there pretty deep compared to everybody else I was racing with and braking about the same point all day and I got to the apex and he drilled us. He must have been doing 50 miles per hour more. Maybe his brakes failed or his brain failed, I don't know."

Kyle Busch had a horrible day after crashing on the front stretch on lap 47 following contact with Jamie McMurray. He was forced to go to the garage for lengthy repairs and returned to the track several laps down, spinning later on lap 177 to cause the final caution of the day.

Despite being classified 43rd he still scored 34 points, which were more than enough to help him keep the lead of the drivers' standing.

Also having a bad day was Clint Bowyer who lost three spots in the points after spinning on lap 80 at the exit of turn three and being collected by Juan Pablo Montoya, who was having a solid race until then.

Pos  Driver                Make       Laps
 1.  Kasey Kahne           Dodge       200
 2.  Brian Vickers         Toyota      200
 3.  Denny Hamlin          Toyota      200
 4.  Dale Earnhardt Jr     Chevrolet   200
 5.  Jeff Burton           Chevrolet   200
 6.  Jimmie Johnson        Chevrolet   200
 7.  Matt Kenseth          Ford        200
 8.  Kurt Busch            Dodge       200
 9.  Carl Edwards          Ford        200
10.  Mark Martin           Chevrolet   200
11.  Bobby Labonte         Dodge       200
12.  AJ Allmendinger       Toyota      200
13.  Kevin Harvick         Chevrolet   200
14.  Jeff Gordon           Chevrolet   200
15.  Greg Biffle           Ford        200
16.  David Gilliland       Ford        200
17.  Martin Truex Jr       Chevrolet   200
18.  Ryan Newman           Dodge       200
19.  David Reutimann       Toyota      200
20.  Jamie McMurray        Ford        200
21.  Scott Riggs           Chevrolet   200
22.  Dave Blaney           Toyota      200
23.  Travis Kvapil         Ford        200
24.  David Ragan           Ford        200
25.  Paul Menard           Chevrolet   200
26.  Casey Mears           Chevrolet   200
27.  Michael McDowell      Toyota      200
28.  Regan Smith           Chevrolet   200
29.  Joe Nemechek          Chevrolet   200
30.  Terry Labonte         Dodge       200
31.  Bill Elliott          Ford        200
32.  Patrick Carpentier    Dodge       200
33.  Reed Sorenson         Dodge       200
34.  Elliott Sadler        Dodge       200
35.  Tony Stewart          Toyota      199
36.  Robby Gordon          Dodge       199
37.  Michael Waltrip       Toyota      199
38.  Juan Montoya          Dodge       157
39.  Clint Bowyer          Chevrolet   155
40.  Jason Leffler         Chevrolet   140
41.  Dario Franchitti      Dodge       137
42.  Sam Hornish Jr        Dodge       130
43.  Kyle Busch            Toyota       95